


Triad

by ArvenaPeredhel



Series: Still Here, All That's Left Of... [3]
Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Gen, and possibly the best thing I've ever written, there's no rape in this fic but the spectre of it looms heavy, this is some seriously heavy shit you guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-25
Updated: 2017-07-25
Packaged: 2018-12-06 15:11:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11603205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArvenaPeredhel/pseuds/ArvenaPeredhel
Summary: Finding oneself is a fearful thing.





	Triad

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SerenLyall](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SerenLyall/gifts).



> This is both inspired by something that did happen and something that might have happened. Those who know which is which are asked to be discreet.

The girl before me is pale and trembling, her eyes downcast and her hands folded upon her lap. I can see the holes in the hem of her skirt and the patches at elbow and knee, the stitches meticulous and tiny. She has desperately tried to make this dress last, and as far as I can tell she’s managed it. Suddenly the delicate gauze and gold embroidery of my own gown are inescapable, catching the light again and again until I am painfully aware of how different we are. It sickens me.  
  
“Who are you?” I ask, and I wonder if my voice is really so thick with self-loathing or if I’m imagining it.  
  
“My name is Tora Naprem,” she says, still kneeling, still staring at her own hands. Her hair is dark and curling but neatly braided in one long plait down her back - this, along with the careful stitches on her dress, hints at a quiet pride that our overlords haven’t yet beaten from her. I wonder how long it will endure. I hope it lasts forever.  
  
“Do you know why you’re here, Tora Naprem?” I continue, and this time I can feel the disgust in my throat. I hope she realizes it’s directed solely at me.  
  
She takes a deep breath, her whole torso shuddering, and answers. “Because the Gul’s mistress asked for a - ”  
  
“I did _not_ ask for this!”  
  
My voice is harsh, almost shouting, and I can feel the walls in my heart starting to crack and crumble as hot tears fill my eyes. The interruption startles her, and for the first time she looks at me. I think I shall scream when I see the anger in her face, now quickly mingling with shock and confusion but there and burning nonetheless.  
  
I raise my bandaged hand to my mouth, almost trying to unsay everything, and avert my own eyes from her dark brown ones. It is my turn to tremble.  
  
“I never wanted this,” I say at last, staring at a small stain on the rug in front of where she kneels. “I only said that I was lonely, I didn’t… I’m sorry…”  
  
My words trail off into silence. How can I tell this… this _outsider_ of the sacrifices I must make simply to survive? How can I warn her? How could Skrain be so cruel as to enmesh some poor girl who probably still dreams of freedom in our private hell? But here she is, and I must save her if I can. _I could say I am displeased with her_ , I think. _Send her back._ But if I send her back she will think I am spoiled, a brat who has forgotten her people.  
  
But if she escapes, even if she hates me, she will live.  
  
So I must hurt her, then, and I screw my courage to the sticking-place that yet lives in the shattered maze of my soul and prepare to do my worst. My eyes snap back up to meet hers, my eyebrows arch in an imperious imitation of a Cardassian glare, and I drop my hand down to my side and square my shoulders. _Now or never_ , I tell myself. I take a deep and cleansing prayer of a breath and begin.  
  
“You - !”  
  
The door opens in the front room. I can hear boots against the floor, the steps heavy after a long day of work.  
  
“Meru?”  
  
It is him. My resolve melts into abject terror, and before I can stop myself I am sinking into panic. _Oh, Prophets, if only I had a few more minutes_ …  
  
“Here I am!” I answer, my voice falsely bright even as I wipe the tears from my eyes and paste a smile over the fear. If I do not answer I will be punished. If I am not pleased to see him I will bleed. “ _Say nothing_ ,” I mouth silently to Tora Naprem, who has glanced over her shoulder and now looks to me in bewilderment. I stare at the arch of the doorway, waiting, waiting. His footsteps grow fainter - he’s turned and gone back to lock us in - and as I make my last-second preparations that I might find favor in his eyes I pray he will walk slowly. My hands smooth the sheer satin of my skirt and I force the anxiety down, down -  
  
\- an alarm bell sounds in my head. Something is wrong, something is amiss, and the instincts honed by years of life as a prisoner are warning me that punishment is near at hand -  
  
\- hand.  
  
Hand.  
  
I am not allowed to bandage my injuries without permission, for the same reason that there are no doors in our private suite save the one that shuts away the world.  
  
I stole a pair of wooden splints and a roll of gauze from his room this morning to ease the pain in my broken wrist. He broke it last night. I was not allowed to tend to it.  
  
And now he is walking back through our front room towards me and there is no time to hide what I’ve done, no place I can conceal the evidence in this sparse sitting room. I jerk my hand behind my back and shake my head frantically at Tora Naprem when she silently raises an eyebrow, but as he entered through the arched doorway I seamlessly slip back into a smile for him.  
  
“Ah, there you are, my dear,” he says, his arms opening to me. I give a deferent curtsy and say nothing, fixing my gaze on him. Perhaps I can hold his attention. Perhaps he will not see our latest addition to the family. But then he looks to the side and sees Tora Naprem still kneeling, and a light flickers to life in his eyes that I do not like.  
  
“When I asked Mavek to find you a servant,” he says lowly, almost purring, “I didn’t think he’d bring us one quite so lovely.” He turns to face her and continues, his voice shifting into something sickly-sweet. “What is your name, my dear?”  
  
A spike of fear stabs right through my heart, and I have to will myself to stay still. I know what this is, and I know what will come. If I can, I must save her somehow.  
  
“My name is Tora Naprem,” she says, only now there is subdued defiance in each syllable. She does not look at him.  
  
“Are you a capable servant, Tora Naprem?” he asks. “Will you treat your mistress’s wishes as your own?”  
  
“What I wish, sir, is to be left alone,” she answers, and there is steel in her voice now. “I’m no one’s servant, not even yours.” She turns her head and looks up at him, her dark brown eyes alight with their own fire, and I am proud of her and terrified of him all at once.  
  
His lip curls. I can see the tension in his face, the anger rippling beneath the surface. I have lived for this long by reading his moods. He is not quite furious yet, but if she does not submit there will be trouble. He shrugs his shoulders, burying the knife-edged darkness, and slowly walks in front of her.  
  
“Look at me,” he says, still sickly-sweet. “Am I so cruel as all that? Haven’t I brought you here, given you food, given you a room of your own?” He crouches down when she looks back at the floor, reaching out one hand to tilt her chin up until she’s forced to make eye contact. “Don’t you think it’s better here than in the ore processing center?”  
  
I can see the doubt in her eyes. I remember being in her place - confused, and afraid, and worried that the wrong answer might get me sent away - and suddenly my fear of being punished for my wrist is much less than the fear that the mind games will begin for her and she will be entrapped.  
  
“Skrain,” I say, smooth and practiced, walking over to him, “you must be tired after such a long day. Why don’t we go to my room and I can run you a bath?”  
  
He pivots to face me, his other hand snapping out and snatching my broken wrist from behind my back.  
  
“Did I say you could speak, Meru?” he asks, his voice thick with anger. But he can feel the gauze and the wood, and he glances at the makeshift bandage. His face goes dark with anger, and his eyes lock on to me. “Did I say you could go into my room, or take my things?” He tightens his grip on my wrist, and I can feel the bones cracking beneath his fingers. I bite my lip to keep from screaming.  
  
“Answer me,” he says, deadly serious. All I can do is weep.  
  
He drops Tora Naprem’s chin, focusing entirely on me, rising to his feet and dragging me close to him. My tongue is bleeding beneath my clenched jaw, and still I moan with every movement his hand makes.  
  
“These,” he says, tearing the splints and the cloth from my arm, “are mine. You are mine.”  
  
“I know,” I gasp, choking the words out. “Please, I’m sorry, please don’t - !”  
  
He squeezes hard on my wrist until something snaps.  
  
My legs give out, my vision goes white. I fall to the floor. He drops my arm, almost throwing me down, and I know he is truly livid.  
  
“Come to me in five minutes,” he says, “and I will give you the punishment you’ve earned.” I am blinded by tears, but I can hear him turn on his heel and stalk into his room. He will be locking up the medical supplies now. I know it. I crumple in on myself and sob.  
  
In the yawning void of his absence, there is only silence. I make absolutely no sound as I cry - this is yet another lesson I have learned beneath his belt, and I will not be taught again. But there is no time for mourning. Already the clock has started for me, so I collect my thoughts and my disparate pieces of self and I begin to prepare for my punishment. He was already tense when he arrived. I shall be the expression of that tension, then - perhaps he shall whip me, or take me over his knee, or break another bone. I wipe away my tears and shove my soul down, down.  
  
But I am not alone this time.  
  
“He… he’s…”  
  
Tora Naprem has been crying. I can hear it in her shaking voice and her gasps for breath.  
  
“I thought…” she says, each of her words hard-won from her sobs, “I was ready to  _hate_ you, I thought you were a _collaborator_ , I thought you’d sold us all out for nice clothes and good food, but you _haven’t_ , you’re just as trapped as the rest of us, and, and…”  
  
She’s breathing hard now, her sentences strung together with scarcely a pause between them. I risk a glance over my shoulder and her dark brown eyes meet my own; her face is marked by pain and pity, and when I do not answer she crawls across the floor until we are close enough to touch.  
  
“He’s in his room,” she begins in a whisper.  
  
“ _Our_ room,” I correct. It is automatic, but I cannot say why this of all things is so important to me.  
  
“Your room,” she amends, eyes wide and furtive. “He won’t be expecting you for a few more minutes. We could go out the door, we could escape.”  
  
“No!” I answer. This, too, is automatic.  
  
“No?” she asks, incredulity creeping into her voice. She tries to take my hand, her fingers brushing my injured wrist. I yank it away from her and smooth my skirt instead, staring at the wrinkles in the fabric.  
  
“No,” I say, with less panic and more finality. “It’s too dangerous, and I’m not allowed out on my own, and where would we go?” Before I can say more, Tora Naprem gently but firmly seizes both my hands in her own, avoiding my injuries and stopping my compulsive corrections for a few moments.  
  
It is the first time in years that someone has touched me without ulterior motive.  
  
“To the ore processing center,” she says, a wild hope creeping into her face. “There are countless Bajoran women who look like us. We could disappear. And then the Resistance could get us away. To Bajor, or a refugee camp, or - !”  
  
“His guards know me by sight,” I say, still staring at my skirt. “And… and he would find me, he would bring me back, he would punish me, he would kill me…”  
  
“Not if I stayed and took your place.”  
  
My head jerks back up, visceral horror forcing me to look at her despite my terror. She is utterly calm, and something in her expression sparks sick anxiety in my chest.  
  
“I’m younger than you,” she presses, “and you saw how he looked at me. I could stay here. Buy your freedom while you run. You could get out, Meru.” It’s the first time she’s used my name, and the sound wrenches my heart and I’m weeping again.  
  
“And leave someone else to face him?” I ask, willing the tears to stop, willing ice into my words. “No.” Slowly, firmly, carefully, I pull my hands away. “Naprem, I… I can’t.” But there is a whirlwind in me now, a torrent of emotions that she pulled up with her talk of escape. It threatens to batter down the walls of my soul.  
  
Leave him? Leave Skrain, leave my home? Can I do that to him? _Ought_ I to? I love him, after all - but is it love? Can I choose to love the man who daily decides if I live or die? Yes, yes, because I go to him freely, because he does not drag me screaming to his bed, because he has called me to service and servitude and I have blossomed, because at his ministrations I come again and again -  
  
\- but I don’t _want_ him.  
  
I have _never_ wanted him.  
  
Without him, though, who am I? Is there yet a living, breathing Kira Meru beneath the wounds he has dealt me and the lessons he has taught me? Does she still exist, or has he stolen even that from me? And with the opening of that ancient wound the truth breaks upon the shores of my heart and I am drowning, drowning. Beneath him I have found myself, or so he said, and maybe that is yet true, but…  
  
… but if I had found myself I would be free to choose.  
  
I am choosing now.  
  
This time, I do not shake or shy from Naprem’s gaze. Instead I take her hands again, and when she tries to speak I shake my head.  
  
“Listen to me,” I say, painfully aware that my final seconds of freedom are creeping away. “He has imprisoned me. Corrupted me. Well and truly warped me. Even if I did escape, even if I did heal, I would never be the same. And I would be a coward if I let the same thing happen to you while I still live and breathe. So stay as my servant if you please, but I am not leaving you to him.” I pull my hands free. She clings to me, and I am forced to ignore the spasms of pain in my wrist as I rise to my feet and turn to face our room.  
  
“Hold on to yourself, Tora Naprem,” I tell her. “Don’t let him break you like he’s broken me.”  
  
I walk to meet my fate without looking back.  
  
For once, I do not fear him.


End file.
